The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper: Season 2024, Episode 10

MisinfoNation: The Trump Faithful

CNN Correspondent Donie O'Sullivan investigates the surge of misinformation on Americans' social media feeds, in their churches, and in their homes. Just over six months out from the next presidential election, a battle for facts, decency, and democracy is playing out far from debate stages and TV studios. O'Sullivan dives deep into this undercurrent of viral misinformation by speaking directly to those who believe in conspiracy theories and those trying to battle them.

"Conspiracy theories that might have been considered fringe in the past are having an increasingly important effect on the American political mainstream," said O'Sullivan. "The convincing of millions of Americans to falsely believe the 2020 election was stolen has opened a gateway to an alternate reality of more conspiracy theorists – a world where it wasn't really Trump supporters that attacked the Capitol on January 6 and a world where Taylor Swift can rig the Super Bowl."

In "MisinfoNation," O'Sullivan visits a church where scripture competes with QAnon, meets a January 6 felon who is now running for Congress, spends a day in the alternate reality of the Trump social media universe, goes behind the viral Taylor Swift Super Bowl conspiracy theory, and speaks to a Neo-Nazi skinhead turned pastor who has a warning for America about Christian Nationalism.